The Glasshouse
by JediShadow
Summary: More that a decade after their greatest experiment went wrong, the Furans want to destroy their enemies once and for all. After a hack into H.I.V.E. shows them the perfect way to do that, the Glasshouse finds another project - and it looks like it'll go just as badly...
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Aaannd I'm back! I came up with the concept of having the Fantastic Four taken to the Glasshouse instead of H.I.V.E. a while ago, and since it's June 1st (exactly one year until H.I.V.E. 9 finally comes our way) I decided I'd get to it. Since Raven's flashbacks are few and far between, it probably won't be as long as my last story, but since everybody loves Raven and the Furans I'm sure you'll all find it in your hearts to forgive me ;-). Happy reading!**

* * *

Anastasia sat back from the laptop in front of her and turned to the man beside her.

"Have you seen this?" she said with a note of excitement as she gestured to the screen.

Pietor leaned forward. His good eye scanned the screen with mild interest.

"I know what you're thinking," he began.

"She'd be perfect!" Anastasia insisted. "Those systems are meant to be impossible to get through, Pietor. Think what we could do with somebody like that."

"And how do you know this is a she?" Pietor enquired, looking amused. Clearly his sister had been doing some research.

She snorted. "She may have fooled the media, but she can't fool me. It's perfect, can't you see?"

"I guess we haven't had new projects for a good while," Pietor said thoughtfully. Ever since their greatest 'project' had failed spectacularly, the regular intake of recruits had gone down significantly. "But we should get some others, too."

"Well, that couldn't hurt. Tell you what, here's an idea. You get into G.L.O.V.E.'s systems and find us some more recruits from there, as many as you like, and then we'll go fetch this girl."

Pietor sighed. "Have you forgotten how hard they are to get through?"

Anastasia nearly smiled. "I suppose you should find some who can hack while you're at it. "

* * *

"Found something?" Anastasia asked as Pietor entered the room with a laptop and a triumphant air.

"Three somethings to be precise." He sat the computer down and brought up a window. "That Trinity girl you were wanting is an Alpha candidate. As are all of these."

Her steely eyes flickered across the names on the screen. "What do we need those two for?"

"Firstly, they are rather too capable to be put in H.I.V.E.'s hands. Second, some hackers couldn't hurt."

"If we get to them before H.I.V.E. does, we could avoid another failure and make ourselves some quite formidable new assassins. Especially now that we have two _very_ dangerous enemies who dislike us." Anastasia made as if to stand up.

"Now?"

Anastasia looked terrifying and unstoppable as she picked up a pistol. "They'll be off to get them in less than a week, Pietor. Get Heinreich to keep the kids in check."

Even though Pietor was nowhere near as keen as she was to just up and go, it was true that their greatest enemies were still at large and sometimes there was just no stopping his sister. He made a small sound of resignation and followed her out of the room.

* * *

The window slid shut with a quiet _click_ as a tall girl dressed in black swung her body over the frame and began to scale downwards. Even if they weren't asleep, it would take a hurricane to get her parents to check on her. As nice as the fame she'd gotten over the past year was, it was rather too anonymous to get them to pay any attention to her. She'd learnt to deal with that by now.

In seconds she had dropped down onto the porch and hiding in a bush. Very few people came by at three in the morning, but it was better to be safe than sorry. Concealed by the shrubbery, she crept across to the end of the street and kept going until she reached Santa Monica Boulevard. There were quite a few more people here, so despite the fact that the majority would be too drunk to notice her, this was the time to turn invisible. Whipping her head to both sides, she sprinted to the wall of a restaurant, slipping into the shadow it cast, and climbed up the wall quickly and gracefully. Once she was on the roof, she kept a low stance as she moved across the rooftops until she reached her destination. Tiffany and Co's Los Angeles store wasn't huge - in fact in comparison to her other exploits it was positively tiny - but it had been almost a month since the Wraith's last escapade, and she didn't want to keep her fans hanging (if you could call them that). Besides, she was eager to find out if the handgun rumour was true.

Shelby spotted a tiny shaft that she would barely fit through just as she heard the tiniest of noises. Sticking to the shadows, she turned - and froze. A man and a woman, both dressed in sharp business suits and - more importantly - holding pistols stood there calmly, as if they'd been expecting her.

The woman smiled. "Hello, Shelby," she said in a strong Russian accent that gave the friendly words an extremely unfriendly edge. "Or do you prefer the Wraith?"

Her eyes flickered from the man to the woman to the streets below her as she wondered how they could see her.

"Don't be so stupid," the woman continued, still smiling and still terrifying. "We're not going to hurt you unless you don't do as we say."

"That's not very reassuring," Shelby frowned as she reluctantly stepped forwards. "Who are you?"

"I am Madame Furan, and I have an offer. You clearly have a talent for becoming invisible, and my brother and I would find that very useful. Come with us and we shall train to become much more than you could ever hope to become with mere jewellery heists."

Shelby opened her mouth to explain that thanks very much, but that wasn't really her thing, and if they didn't mind she'd be on her way now, but she didn't. Madame Furan, whoever she was, had singled her out as talented and presumably come all the way from Russia to recruit her, while her parents wouldn't pay attention to her if their lives depended on it. Besides, she doubted that the pistols were there for decoration.

"All right."

"Oh good," Furan said. "I'd hate to have come all the way to California for a dead body." Shelby suddenly wondered if she'd made the right choice.

.

Wing was sitting on the edge of a sofa with a book in his hands. He hadn't seen his dad in days now, and was becoming increasingly more bored - this was his third time reading _Black Rain_. By now he was craving excitement, but when he heard the unmistakeable click of a safety catch that desire seemed to melt away. The book fell to the floor with a thud as he looked at the imposing strangers who were suddenly standing in the living room.

"If you'd be so kind as not to attack us," Furan began. "It's been a long journey."

Despite her request, Wing assumed a defensive stance. "Who are you? Why are you here?"

"Because of you," she replied with a cold smile. "More specifically, your talents. If you come with us now we can turn those talents into something much greater."

The words themselves were friendly and inviting. The way she said them wasn't.

"And if I refuse?"

"Then you die."

Wing firmly believed that there were things far worse than death. However, thirteen was so young to die and death was so _finite_ _._

"I would prefer to stay alive a little longer."

.

 _"...she's always holed up with a computer, it's ridiculous. She won't want to come. But I do - obviously - can you give me the details?"_

Laura closed the recording with a somewhat smug expression.

"Very impressive."

That hadn't been the computer.

"Hello, Laura. We could use those skills."

Slowly she turned to see that she was no longer alone.

"Um..." she looked apprehensive. "Could I have some more explanation?"

The woman - she was clearly the one doing who did the talking - smiled. That didn't help. "I am going to give you a choice, my dear. Come with us and we will train you. Or Pietor can shoot you." She was clearly not joking.

"That's not a choice."

"You will learn soon enough that there is no such thing, Laura. Come along."

'

Otto sat on his hotel bed, his laptop in front of him and the television blaring.

 _"Quite frankly, you can take your problems and shove them. Thank you."_

Grinning, he typed in a few more commands before shutting the computer and turning around. A tall, foreign-looking man held it out for him.

"Thank you," he said. "Wait - what?"

"You're very welcome."

Otto looked extremely confused. "Who - why - what -"

"It's nice to meet you too," the woman said. "Clearly you enjoy causing chaos. Would you like to help us do just that?"

"In what sense?" It seemed like a silly question - she obviously didn't have pranking the Prime Minister in mind.

"This and that," she replied. That was explanation enough. "Oh, did I forget to mention? If you say no you die."

"Fair enough."

* * *

"Hand to hand combat, swap partners after five minutes, go!"

That was the first thing Otto heard as he dropped into the pit. He barely had time to acknowledge the words before a tall boy covered in scars sent a powerful kick towards his jaw.

"Nice to meet you too," he muttered, just dodging the blow before throwing a punch towards the boy's stomach. Although he'd dealt with bullies of all sorts over the years, fighting was never really something he'd looked into very much - he'd never excelled in that area, and Otto didn't like to do badly. Unfortunately, he didn't appear to have much of a choice. He blocked attacks half-heartedly for a few moments, trying to think; he couldn't fight strong, so he would have to fight smart.

The next time a punch came towards him, he took a step closer. The punch landed in the air behind him as Otto quickly reached out for a pressure point at the boy's neck. Thinking that he was going for a headlock, he caught Otto's arm instead of stepping backwards - and let go just as quickly as he dropped to the floor, unconscious.

In an instant Pietor Furan had appeared. "What did you do to Aleksei?"

"Knocked him out."

"Yes, I can see that," he said impatiently. "How?"

"I pressed a nerve ending."

Pietor laughed, which only made Otto feel more uncomfortable. "You are weak, but you use your brain. Not all opponents can be defeated that way. Change partners!"

He didn't move fast enough to pick a partner and ended up with a pretty Scottish girl who had apparently suffered the same fate. She hesitated before moving to punch him.

"That is not an attack." Pietor was still there. "That is a child playing. Again, properly."

She made an apologetic face before punching again. There was more force in it, but Otto could see it coming and blocked it fairly easily.

"You are not even trying."

This time she landed a powerful kick to his chest, causing him to almost double over. Otto guessed that she was envisioning him as a different target.

Pietor gave her a small nod, then turned to Otto. "What are you waiting for? Attack!"

He finally walked away.

"Just pretend it's him," Otto muttered as he went in for a wave of attacks.

* * *

Shelby entered the dormitory she'd been assigned to. It was small and cramped and looked like a prison cell.

"You're the new kids?" A girl asked as she and three others flopped down on their bunks.

Shelby nodded.

The girl rolled her eyes. "Good luck." She was snoring a few seconds later.

"This isn't what I had in mind when they said they'd train me," Laura, who was in the bunk beside her, said with a groan.

"No kidding," Shelby replied, turning to face her. "I was thinking, you know, underground Mission:Impossible secret location full of high-tech spy equipment and robots and climbing arenas and whatever."

"How can you even talk so much?" Otto's advice had proven too effective, and the bruise on his jaw was making speech difficult.

"I need to hear words that aren't insulting my fighting ability," Shelby replied. "And you are?"

"Otto."

"Wing."

"Pained."

"Hi there pained," Otto said, "nice to meet you."

"Please don't - it's Laura."

There was an awkward silence for a few moments.

"So," Otto said quietly, "any ideas on how we get out?"

"Oh, I have one," Laura said. "In a coffin."

"If they are training us to fight, it must be so they can send us on missions," Wing suggested.

"So we just stay until we're good enough to get sent out?" Laura sounded desolate.

"If you like, I could teach you at a slower pace," Wing said. All three of them had been paired with him at one point, and had noticed that he was the only one out of the new group that had any idea what to do.

"Me too please," Shelby said quickly. "Anyway, it can't be all bad. I for one wouldn't mind being able to kick that much ass. And I must say I rather like the uniform on me." Laura snorted.

"It's not just that, though," Otto pointed out. "Haven't you seen the other kids? They're hardly even human any more. I don't want to go all I-am-nothing-but-a-killing-machine."

"It seems to me like that is what they want," Wing agreed. "So I agree that we should try and avoid that fate."

"Fair enough, and I certainly don't want them to win," Laura sighed, "but I hardly think these kids were brought here thinking, I can't wait to become a heartless instrument of murder!"

"I think they were brought in younger than we were," Shelby said. "But yes. They've clearly been doing this a while. So what? Let's just go along with it, act like we're believing everything they say, et cetera et cetera. Soon enough we'll get to go out."

"Looking forward to it already," Otto said tiredly.


	2. Chapter 2

"Kill me," Otto moaned as he fell over for what felt like the hundredth time.

"If nothing else it would provide a reasonable explanation for your complexion," Shelby grinned tiredly. She was sitting on her bed with Laura's head in her lap as they both watched Wing attempt to teach Otto.

"I will remind you that you chose to learn," Wing said with a smile.

"Well, yes," Otto said crossly, "but I thought the idea was that it hurt less than with the Furans."

Laura made a sound. "How did you expect to learn combat without hurting yourself?"

"Laura is right," Wing nodded. "But the difference is I am instructing you rather than throwing you to the sharks."

"And after what, two weeks of this? Two weeks, has it really been that long?" Shelby looked horrified. "Anyway, after two weeks of training Furan style, training Wing-style really shouldn't be such an effort."

"You do it then, if it's so easy," Otto challenged her. "It's your turn now anyway."

"Sure, no problem." Shelby got up, gently pushing Laura off, and took Otto's place. "Sorry, Laura, go find a pillow." She turned to face Wing. "So what do I do?"

They began to spar, chatting quietly as they did so, three pairs of eyes watching intently.

* * *

"How long?"

Almost one hour before the rest of the Glasshouse was to be woken, Anastasia and Pietor Furan sat oppostie a girl with white-blond hair and cold eyes.

"Almost since they came," she replied. "I'm not certain of exactly when." After noting that her latest recruits were not only progressing faster than she'd expected but keeping a strong spirit even when they were bruised and bloody, Anastasia had asked their roommate to see if her suspicions were correct. Serafina had been given just as much choice in the matter as she had over being brought to the Glasshouse.

"Just training, or do they plan to escape?" Pietor cut in.

"They chat a lot, but not about escaping - more a morale boost," Serafina explained. "And they complain a lot - errr - about you."

"I see," Anastasia said, frowning in concentration. "You can be excused from training this morning to catch up on some sleep. Run along now." Serafina nodded and darted back to the dormitory.

"I suppose we should have foreseen this," she said as she turned to face her brother. "They were Alpha students, after all."

"Now, don't you start giving up just because they're taking a little longer than normal," Pietor said quickly, although there was worry is his tone. "It has only been a fortnight. If we can do right what we did wrong before, then they will prove to be just as deadly as our dear Natalya was."

"And if we go wrong again?" Anastasia couldn't keep the panic from her voice now. "Why didn't we take Henchmen instead? Or leave that godforsaken school alone and find some killers on the streets?" She shook her head. "We cannot go wrong, do you understand? They will not leave until they are broken. Or perhaps one or two will not leave at all." As a plan formed in her head, she allowed herself to smile.

"I would agree with you," Pietor sighed, "except now it is not just Nero that we need to take care of. I am not so sure that two of them, however well we train them, will manage to kill them both."

"And would you ever have dreamed that Natalya could take your eye before the age of sixteen, leave me almost dead before eighteen? No, Pietor, we will make them deadly. However many of them remain before we make that happen."

* * *

Maximilian Nero sighed as he saw the tired face of the woman who had just entered. She had come to deliver news, but a single glance towards her expression told him all that he needed to know.

"Still nothing," Raven told him, confirming his fears. "None of them were likely suicide attemptees - even if they had been, their corpses wouldn't have been this hard to find. Somebody took them, Max."

"But who?" That was the question that had been gnawing at him for the past fortnight. "Who would kidnap four teenagers and take them off the face of the earth like that?"

"Besides us, you mean." There was a small smile hidden beneath the confused frown.

"Besides us." Nero let out a sigh. "This was either some random, if extremely well done kidnap -"

"Which we both know it wasn't."

"-or one of our enemies."

Nero turned back to his computer and looked through some archives. "The problem is, it's a rather long list."

"Do you actually keep a list of G.L.O.V.E.'s enemies there?" Raven asked as she looked over his shoulder, slightly amused.

"Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer...now, let's see. I don't much like Cypher but it's extremely unlikely that the kidnapper is part of the G.L.O.V.E. ruling council..."

"Have you considered the possibility that the four disappearances are unrelated?"

Nero half smiled. "Have you considered that they all spontaneously combusted? He's definitely dead...she wouldn't have the subtletly to pull this off..." he stopped short as he scrolled past a name, one that hadn't troubled him in years.

"What?"

With fear in his face, he turned back to look at Raven. "When was the last time you heard word of Pietor Furan?"

* * *

"In pairs!" Pietor yelled. "Fight until one can fight no longer. Go!"

Standing at the edge of the pit, his eyes drifted from fighter to fighter, the newest ones in particular. They were all spaced out, maintaining appearances (they'd decided that if one of them was sent off and didn't come back and the Furans new they were close, no words of denial would be listened to), and fighting with a vigour that would have been welcome, had he and Anastasia been the ones controlling it.

Now, when Serafina moved to aim a kick at Shelby, she would catch the leg and trip her up instead of dodging wildly. When Aleksei sent relentless punches towards Otto, he would block each one without even pausing for breath. Each one knew the other to be exhausted, but to show that they were would be to let the Furans win, and the unspoken agreement was that it until they left the Glasshouse, it was them against the Furans. Even if defying them meant a bullet to the head - which they were all reasonably confident that it would after enough time - their captors couldn't be allowed a moment of victory, not even the false kind.

Laura had managed, through a combination of Wing's guidance and sheer luck, to get her opponent on the ground. As the girl beneath her tried to claw herself free, Pietor Furan dropped into the pit. When he spoke, it wasn't a request. It was an order. The kind that you followed or died.

"Kill her."

Laura's head snapped around to look at him as if checking that she'd heard him correctly, even though he knew that she had understood every word. Around her, nearly everybody had paused their battles.

"She cannot escape. You have won. So finish it."

Any hope that he had been joking withered away and her eyes flickered across to where Shelby looked back at her helplessly, silently saying, _it's her or you._ Pietor did not miss the interaction.

Laura shifted her gaze back to the girl thrashing beneath her, still trying to escape. It looked like she was fighting back tears. So was Laura.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, so quietly that even she could barely hear it.

Pietor said it again. _"Kill her."_

And she did.


	3. Chapter 3

"Was that entirely necessary?" Anastasia asked as she watched Shelby, Otto and Wing lead a quietly crying Laura to lunch.

"If Agnesse had been capable enough to ever carry out our missions, a girl who'd been training scarcely three weeks would not have been able to kill her."

Anastasia sighed. "That's not what I meant."

"She needed to be made a killer," Pietor said simply. "We can make her a fighter, and a very talented one at that, but we do not want our enemies harmed or even permanently disabled. We want them _dead._ And if we cannot be sure that she will do that, we might as well throw her to the wolves."

"There would have been ways to make her a killer that don't involve making her hate us even -"

"Three times," Pietor interrupted her. "I told her to kill Agnesse three times before she did so. Next time, I will only need to tell her once and the time after that - perhaps I will not need to tell her at all."

* * *

"Laura..." Shelby stopped. She opened her mouth again, but closed it after a moment, at a loss for words. She could think of nothing to say.

Thankfully Wing didn't have that issue. "Laura, do not think that just because of...what happened...you are less of a good person."

Laura looked at him, rubbing her red-rimmed eyes again. "I killed her, Wing. She didn't do anything wrong, she had a life ahead of her-"

"Did she?" Shelby had at last come up with something. "Or thanks to the Furans, did she have nothing to look forward to but a whole life spent feeling the way you are now?"

Otto looked alarmed at Shelby's sudden burst of anger. "Calm down, she doesn't need -"

"Oh, shut up," she snapped. "This is what they _want_ , Laura. They want you to think that now since you've killed one person -" Laura flinched, but Shelby went on "-that what's to stop you from killing everyone else they tell you to kill? As far as those - those - I'll think of an appropriate word in a minute - as far as they're concerned, that's one of us who won't run off if they're tasked with a mission. They're _evil,_ Laura, you can't give them power over you. Demons! There we go."

"But they do have power over us, Shel," Laura sighed. "They can hurt us, or kill us, or make us into killers, and there's nothing we can do about it.."

"That's what they want you to think," Otto insisted, although as far as he was concerned she was right. "They're only human, and there's only two of them, and there are four of us, and after enough time we'll have learned all their skills. But if you let yourself think that there's no escape, then there won't be."

"All the same," Shelby added quickly, after a moment of thought, "keep acting like they've won you over, you'll get out faster."

Laura glared, but not at Shelby. "When we're good enough, when we get out of here, we kill them, okay? And I won't feel bad about it."

* * *

 _"Proklyat'ye!"_

Raven slammed the laptop onto Nero's desk.

"I'm afraid I've not been studying up on my Russian," Nero said, looking both amused and a bit concerned at Raven's frustration.

"Well, it's not polite," Raven replied with a small smile. "I've _never_ not been able to track anybody."

"If it really is Pietor Furan that has them, then I hardly doubt you can be blamed for that," Nero reassured her. "Besides, you track better on the field than from a laptop. He's likely in Russia or somewhere nearby. Go look for him, and if he has them then we get our Alphas back and if he doesn't...well, it's a chance for revenge at least."

"But those students from the Science and Technology stream -"

"I'm on top of all the escape attempts," Nero insisted. "Last year, three times as many students were having difficulty accepting their new life. And how many escaped?"

"Ugh. Fine. If I find him and I die, avenge me." Raven stood up.

"You won't die, Natalya. I know you won't."

Raven smiled grimly. "Let's hope not."

* * *

Shelby threw a punch at Laura. Blinking at the wrong time, Laura grunted in pain.

"You need to snap out of it, Laura," Shelby complained. She was the only one out of the three of them who wasn't treating her like a suicide risk, but neither approach seemed to be having much effect.

"You try being made to kill somebody who didn't deserve it," Laura sighed. She kicked weakly at Shelby's chest, but she deflected the attack with ease.

"If it's all the same to you, I'm focusing on killing somebody who definitely does deserve it," Shelby replied. "Two somebodies, actually."

"I know," Laura grumbled, "And I am too. But that doesn't make it any better."

"Well, if you keep going on like this, you'll be killed before you get the chance. I'm not saying that now you should go psychopathic ninja assassin, but if you want them dead, you need to stop moping." She saw Laura's expression and sighed. "Okay, fine, mope for like a day, but then you need to keep working at this. Otto, Wing, say something."

"Nah, you're doing fine," Otto said, not taking his eyes off his duel with Wing.

"You're the worst. Laura, _please._ "

Laura sighed for a moment, then moved backwards as if she was about to lie down on her bunk, when suddenly she grabbed hold of Shelby and flipped her over her back. Shelby cursed under her breath and rubbed her shoulder. "Okay. I'm done moping."

* * *

Russia was cold in September, but Raven never felt it anymore. She'd lived on the Russain streets for several years, back when she was still Natalya. In comparison to that, she was almost warm.

Navigating through the city as though she'd lived there all her life, Raven kept to the shadows, sneaking to where people thought nobody was listening, trying to catch word of her target. In such a crime-filled area as this, she heard plenty of interesting stories, but it was not until well past midnight, when most of the city lights had been switched off and in some alleys you could hear a pin drop, that she finally saw from beneath the rooptops she perched on two shadowy figures hurrying to a more obscured corner, not until she'd followed them silently for almost twenty minutes that she heard the word 'kill'.

"And you're sure he can kill them?"

The voice was quiet and muffled and in a foreign language that would be incomprehensible to most native Russians, but made perfect sense to Raven. The suddenness of the voice startled her.

"He could kill anyone. Give me the money, I'll get it to him and they'll all be gone by the morning."

The second voice spoke in the same language, but the accent was unmistakeable. Raven shuddered slightly.

"If you're sure, here -"

There was the _crack_ of his neck being snapped and the quiet whisper of a Russian farewell. Within a minute, the corpse had been disposed of and the killer silently leaving the crime scene.

"Privet, Furan," Raven whispered as she followed him from afar, a cold smile on her face. "It's been too long."

* * *

 **A/N: Hi folks! I would've updated earlier but I had a serious case of writer's block and I didn't want to write something flimsy just so I could get another chapter out sooner. Anyway, I wanted to say thanks for the amazingly positive response on the last chapter (I was rather proud of it), I hope this one doesn't lower the bar.**

 **And one more exciting thing: there's a petition on for H.I.V.E. to become a film franchise after ten long years of waiting. Here it is, let's keep the fandom alive!** **p/paramount-pictures-paramount-to-begin-production-on-movie-adaptation-of-h-i-v-e-by-mark-walden**

 **Okay, that's all. Until the next chapter!**


	4. Chapter 4

"Hand-to-hand, switch partners every five minutes," Pietor barked out over the pit. "Go!"

"Otto," Laura hissed out of the side of her mouth, inclining her head. "With me."Otto looked confused - afraid of being made to kill each other since the previous month's excitement, they'd all agreed not to fight with one another if they could help it - but he walked over to Laura, looking at her expectantly.

"Well, fight!" she muttered, throwing an array of punches and kicks in his direction. "Or he'll notice."

"What is it?" he said, still confused. "I thought we'd said -"

"Quieter," Laura whispered. "And don't move your lips so much. I think we're being spied on."

"Who?" Otto glanced behind him; Laura crouched down an swung her foot out. He got to his feet in an instant.

"Not at the moment," Laura mouthed, not pausing her attacks. "That other girl in our dormitory - well, would you stay asleep during two simultaneous duels and chatter?"

"You think she's telling them about that?" Otto kicked at Laura, his dialogue better hidden now. "Why?"

"Well, it's not because she just loves them that much," she whispered, rolling her eyes. "Why are we here?"

"So what do we do?" Otto muttered. "Recruit her? Kill her?"

"You're hilarious," Laura replied, putting just a little more power into her kicks.

"Sorry. But what?"

"I have a plan, but we have to stop, obviously. But gradually, because if we're training one night and not the next she'll know we're onto her."

"But Laura," Otto reminded her, twisting his elbow around to block a punch, "the whole point of the training is that we _train."_

"We're good enough that we won't die," Laura insisted. "The sooner they start thinking they've won, the sooner we get out."

Otto sighed. "And if it doesn't work?"

"We die," Laura replied grimly. "But I think we've settled that there's at least a fifty percent likelihood of that happening anyway."

* * *

"Ow, ow, ow, ow - ugh." Shelby crashed to the floor with a pained expression and hoisted herself back onto her bed. "Why bother? We're not getting any better."

"I have noticed improvements in your fighting techniques," Wing argued.

"That would happen anyway. We do this from eight til six with almost no breaks, of course we improve."

"She has a point, you know," Laura said with a sigh. "And we'll hardly do better with sleep deficiency."

"It's the principle of the thing," Otto said, but he was stifling a yawn. "You know, rebellion and all?"

"That was before we knew rebelling would be so exhausting," Shelby said sleepily. "I don't know, make it just once or twice a week."

"But that would be giving up," Otto complained. "Remember what we agreed?"

"That we wouldn't die and that we'd try and find a way out," Laura mumbled with her face in a pillow, grateful for the cover it gave her. "Why not waste sleep doing that?"

"I do not want to give up anymore than you do," Wing said gently, "but I have to agree with them there. The training was so we could avoid serious injury during our time here. Perhaps we should just look at escape possibilities when we can."

Giving a perfectly done fake sigh, Otto lay down. "Okay, okay. Once a week for rebellion's sake and from now we spend our time hunting for ways out."

They all bade each other goodnight and Laura smiled into her pillow as she saw Serafina watching through half-closed lids.

* * *

"So do they mean to escape?"

Once again, Serafina sat opposite the Furans, trying to hide the fear in her eyes as they smiled at her expectantly.

"I think so," she replied, stifling a yawn. "They made it sound more like they just wanted to survive and if they could, they'd escape."

"They are putting their survival above their freedom," Pietor said as if it made all the sense in the world. "I see."

"Not all of them," Anastasia frowned at him, "They - Serafina, you may leave now." Serafina did not need to be told twice.

"Perhaps one or more of them is too cowardly to want to die escaping," she continued once Serafina was out of earshot. She knew that she had always been the brains and Pietor the fists, but it often got on her nerves that he never thought things through. "But remember they are Alphas, and at least one of them fears confinement above all else. It doesn't add up."

"You think the girl lied?"

"Serafina is too afraid to lie to us, but despite our best efforts they are apparently not. And the other thing they are apparently not is stupid."

"So now what?"

"They are too intelligent to try and escape from here," Anastasia said, talking more to herself than to her brother now. "But I have every belief that they intend to escape."

* * *

Sighing with fatigue, Serafina tiptoed back to her dormitory and slid through the crack in the door.

"We've been expecting you."

She started as she saw her four roommates all sitting on their bunks with one leg crossed over the other and smug smiles.

"Pугательство." She groaned as she collapsed onto her bed. "I'm sorry! I don't like them either, but they just -"

"We're aware of why you were spying on us," Otto said, unsettingly like Anastasia in his sinister new demeanor. "Do they know we know of this arrangement?"

"I think they're smart enough to be suspicious," Serafina said uncomfortably. "What do you want me to do about it?"

Otto, Laura, Shelby and Wing muttered something to each other for several agonizingly long moments before Otto turned back again.

"How often do you have these sessions of yours?"

"Once a week," she muttered grudgingly.

"If they call you back again for more discussion, you can tell them that we train without our old spirit and that it would appear as though we're doing it simply because we promised we would. The second time, say the same thing. And the third, and the fourth, and the fifth. But the sixth time, if they are still requesting those reports, say that we have ceased to train altogether. That will have totalled three months since we came, I think that's a convincing amount of time. Alright?"

"But what happens if she sees I'm lying?"

Otto began to speak but Laura interrupted him. "Have you ever killed a person on their orders, Serafina?"

Frowning with anticipation, she nodded.

"I see. How many times?"

Serafina nearly snorted. "Too many."

Laura nodded. "The first time you did it, how did you feel?"

"Like hell on earth."

"And the last? The most recent time you murdered someone, how did that make you feel?"

"It didn't," she whispered. "Not at all."

"So, essentially," Laura said with the air of a lawyer preparing to deliver a closing argument, "the Furans have robbed you of your sense of humanity, your value of human life, your ability to feel regret or guilt. It is possible that they will see through your lie, and it is possible that you will die for it, but it would be far worse to have to live under them."

Sighing, Serafina put on her bravest expression and nodded.

Instantly, all of their faces melted into relief. "Thank you, Serafina. Goodnight."

* * *

"Malpense!"

Pietor Furan's harsh voice snapped him out of his animated duel. "Madame Furan would like to speak with you."

Had they been discovered? Otto wondered with a sinking feeling in his stomach as he was taken to where Anastasia sat at the edge of the pit, watching over the fighting with a smile. It had been over six months since their arrival, and there had been very little in way of excitement since the drama with Serafina.

"Mr Malpense, it's good to see you're doing well."

"Thank you," he said anxiously.

"In fact, I think you're doing well enough that it might be time for your first mission," she continued. "Nothing overly complicated, just some inconveniently arrogant fool that keeps challenging our authority. Do you think you could handle that?"

Otto nodded, excitement and confusion swelling within him. Everybody in front of him kept on fighting, but he noticed people kept craning their necks or straining to hear what was being discussed.

"We were hoping to send you off at once," Anastasia explained. "We have a briefing here, and some weapons here, and my brother will take you to a starting location where you can begin. Is there anything that you don't understand?"

 _Yes,_ Otto thought, feeling mystified as to how their plan had worked in so little time. He had heard that it could take years before being sent out on a mission. But he nodded numbly.

"Wonderful." Anastasia's smiled widened and she handed him a profile with a picture and some details on it.

 **NAME: Otto Malpense**

 **AGE: 13**

 **D.O.B.: Unknown**

 **D.O.D.: March 13th 2007**

Something hard pressed into his skull as his sinking feeling was confirmed.

"You do not escape from me, Malpense," Anastasia said, still smiling. "Goodbye."

Shelby, Laura and Wing broke into a sprint and leapt out of the pit with an alarming speed as Otto watched the trigger moving backwards in slow motion. A flurry of legs and arms were suddenly all that he could see and within moments both Furans were doubled over.

"Nice moves," Otto made out, panting heavily. Just then another figure came into his view.

"I totally agree," Raven said.


	5. Chapter 5

Otto squinted at the strange woman who had just appeared and attacked both the Furans without hesitation, wondering if he had died and gone to heaven. He never thought anybody would have the skill or the nerve, and yet there she was, slashing two identical swords through the air as the apparently mystified Pietor and Anastasia tried to tackle her.

And now the woman was clapping impatiently in his face. "You're alive, and you're welcome. Now help me, will you?"

"Thank you," Otto said, still confused. "Who -"

"It's Raven, but not at the moment!" she snapped. "I was only expecting one of them, so you, and you three, I assume you've learned _something_ in the last six months. In fact, everybody who doesn't like them - that has to be all of you - here's your chance. Come on!"

All the duels had come to an abrupt halt as the recruits looked on in confusion, trying to decide if it was really possible to defeat their captors. The slight moment of hesitation was interrupted as Anastasia picked up her dropped pistol and fired several rounds at Raven. Suddenly something clicked and Shelby and Laura were slamming into Anastasia, Wing was helping Raven fight Pietor as she dodged the bullets, and everybody seemed to realise that they finally had the opportunity to escape.

Then all hell broke loose.

The deadly sound of bullets rang through the air again and again, but it was impossible to tell where they landed through the fifty odd recruits who were crowding together and descending upon the Furans. At the center of the sudden riot were Otto, Laura, Shelby and Wing, along with their new addition of Raven, relentlessly unleashing everything they had been taught.

"You cannot win, Natalya," Anastasia said, appearing almost totally unfazed by the challenge except for the barest hint of fear that flashed across her face every time she saw Raven - or Natalya, Otto noted , as she was apparently called. If the Furans themselves, who by now everyone saw as the embodiment of fear, were afraid of their new ally, he thought to himself, perhaps they could escape after all.

"When you're two against fifty-five," Raven replied calmly as bullets grazed past her, missing their target by milimetres, "a smarter thing to say might be that we win and you surrender."

"Stupid girl," Anastasia said with her deadly smile. "Did you learn nothing from us? You do not yield."

"I also learnt not to chat while you're trying to kill somebody," Raven replied, looking satisfied at her response as she led her twin swords in a deadly, rapid dance, seeming as though she could keep going for the rest of time without tiring or slipping up. It was hard not to just stop and watch in awe, but, Otto reminded himself, he was in the middle of a battle that looked as though it would have enough casualties without him stopping to observe.  
No matter how many waves of attackers came at the Furans, they retaliated with double the strength. Several were already in heaps on the floor nursing their wounds, and some didn't appear to be getting up any time soon. Otto was sure that they could eventually take out their enemies, but not without more injury and even death that he was willing to have on his conscience. Ducking down, he slipped through the mass of fighters and headed for what he was fairly certain was Pietor's office. Trying the door, Otto grunted in frustration as it stayed stubbornly in place - within moments someone would notice and then he would have a bullet in his skull.

"There you are," a voice came from behind, making Otto start. Shelby elbowed him aside and inspected the lock Otto was having difficulty with.

"Once all this is over, I'll have to teach you how to do this," she said, stepping aside to reveal the door swinging open. "Looking for guns, I take it?"

"What else?" Otto replied, sounding distracted as he rummaged through drawers and shelves as quickly as he could. "Have you seen either of the others?"

"Laura's fine, and I'm reasonably sure Wing is secretly made of steel or something. Ahh." Shelby held out two awkwardly large rifles. "Any idea how to use these?"

"Yeah," Otto said, grabbing one and inspecting it, "you pull the trigger."

Both fiddling with their new guns' mechanisms, Shelby and Otto made their way back to the fight to see even more of their fellow fighters seemingly dead. Shelby clenched her jaw and nodded at Otto, ducking into the crowd to find their targets.

"You could have just asked," Raven said as she saw her behind Anastasia struggling with her rifle, nodding towards the two handguns clipped to either end of her belt. "You know how to use those?"

"No talky talky when fighty fighty, remember?" Shelby called out in reply,."I'll figure it out."

"Still, you might prefer one of these," Raven replied, unclipping one gun and tossing it to Shelby in a blindingly fast maneuver that finished with both swords still in hand. Nodding, she pressed a few buttons on the side and fired a test shot into the celiling before slipping back into the crowd.

Time went by and more people fell, but Pietor and Anastasia's desire to stay alive was outstanding and no matter how much the crowd thinned they never seemed to be in the same place as the bullets that Shelby and Otto were firing at them. Admittedly, their aim had had very little chance to improve and neither wanted to take the wrong person out by accident, meaning that eventually they, Wing, Laura and Raven were the only ones who hadn't fallen or fled.

"Your spirit was always what I liked about you, Natalya," Anastasia said, firing a shot at the same moment that she swayed to dodge the one flying her way, "but it will do you no favours today."

"It's Raven now," Raven countered, hurling one sword across towards her as she pulled her remaining gun out of her belt and fired several shots at once. Anastasia's hand flashed up to catch the sword as she ducked to avoid the bullets, but not before one had embedded itself in her leg. She hissed in pain, firing blindly to keep herself safe for a moment as she recovered, then straightened up again and advanced towards Raven with her newly acquired sword.

"Raven, Natalya," Pietor said dismissively, "a corpse has no name. You may be skilled, but do not forget that we trained you. You cannot -"

Two shots rang out, and they sliced through the air before finding their way into Pietor's skull. As he collapsed, Anastasia cried out, turning to face him, and then another bullet came to silence her once and for all. Every remaining head turned around in unison to see Laura, standing with her body faced sideways and holding a small black handgun pointed in front of her.

* * *

 **A/N: Hi folks! First: sincerest apologies for the ridiculously long delay. It was for a good cause ( if you can call four seasons of Game of Thrones a good cause ;) ), but I apologise all the same, especially with the cliffhanger at the end of the last chapter.**

 **Anyway, the next chapter will probably be the last one, because I honestly can't see a way to make it last any longer without dragging it on quite a lot, but it was fun to write and I hope everyone enjoyed it. It'll be up within the day to make up for the wait, so until then!**


	6. Chapter 6

"I know what you're going to say, Max," Raven said as she entered Nero's office.

"I'm sure you wouldn't have minded when it was you," Nero immediately began to argue, "and -"

"I'm not playing therapist with the poor kids. They're traumatised enough without having an assassin trying to talk to them about feelings. You do it."

"You're the one who knows what they've experienced," Nero insisted, "but if you won't do it -"

"Just get an actual therapist!"

"-then we'll just have to hope they manage without it."

"I'm sure they will," Raven sighed, sitting down. "They're tough kids."

* * *

"So," Laura called out as she swung her arm out, a thin steel cord extending. "How're you settling in?"

Moments after their victory, Raven had ushered the surviving few into a huge aircraft that she called a Shroud, where she then explained that they were being taken to what was essentially a new prison, which also happened to be a school for villainy. Even though she had heavily emphasized the positive aspects of their new home, nearly everybody had been skeptical until they had seen the luxurious cavern they were being transferred to. After it became clear that it was, in fact, a school for villainy which did, in fact, teach stealth and codebreaking and villainous studies, complaints had quietened to a non-existent level within moments.

"Better than you," Shelby replied cheerfully, circling Laura as she swung from the cord extensions on each arm easily. "Don't know what you're finding so hard, Brand."

"Not all of us were secretly jewel thieves," Otto said as he passed by, emphasizing the last two words. "Six months and you didn't think to tell us?"

"It never came up!" Shelby said indignantly. "We were too busy trying not to die, remember?"

"You up there!" an angry voice yelled from below. "I don't care if you're new, less talking and more grappling."

"Sorry, Colonel Francisco," Shelby yelled back innocently. "We were just talking about how great this class is and what an amazing teacher we have." As Francisco grunted, Shelby winked at the others. "Sorry, but I'm off now."

* * *

"Well," Shelby sighed as she flopped onto a beanbag, "as far as prisons go, this could be an awful lot worse."

"Aye, in fact, I dare say it's rather nice," Laura agreed with a grin, sitting down beside Shelby and the others.

"Oh, now you're pushing it," Otto said with a weak smile. "All the same, I'm in much less hurry to escape from here."

"Although the fact that somebody who is happy to challenge the Furans to a fight could have something to do with that," Wing suggested, raising an eyebrow.

"To be honest, I'm mostly just tired," Otto replied, grinning. "At this rate, it'll be at least a month before I've got the energy to escape."

"We're still doing that?"

"Oh, we're still doing that. Worst case scenario, they give us detention then throw us back into our swimming pool and tech lab dorms."

"I knew there was a reason we were friends," Shelby grinned, leaning forward with a dramatic posture. "So, what's your plan?"

"Sorry, top secret." The others laughed. "Okay, okay, I need my Blackbox. Hey, HIVEmind?"

* * *

 **A/N: Yeah, uhh...that's kind of it. Sorry. The main bit of the story was how the fantastic four managed to survive the Glasshouse and once that was written, I sort of ran out of inspiration. All the same, hope this tiny epilogue tied up the loose ends well enough and that the good part of the story was good enough to make up for the acceptable bits around the edges. Until the next story!**


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